Our Seat At The Table

From NCNW’s founding by Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune in New York City on December 5, 1935, our organization has had a seat at the table when social justice has been on the agenda. If there is no chair with NCNW’s name on it, NCNW members have followed this good counsel of Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm: “If they don’t give you a seat at the table, bring a folding chair.”

Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Ph.D.

When I assumed the rolls of Chair of The Board and 7th President of the National Council of Negro Women in keeping with our organization’s tradition of social activism, I issued two calls to our membership. The first call was to become even more active in the struggle for civil rights and women’s rights. The second call was for NCNW to become more intergenerational. And clearly, the young women of NCNW should be fully welcomed to bring their commitment to activism into the daily work of our organization. It is in keeping with that call to action that on separate occasions – I in August, 2021and our Sister Executive Director Janice Mathis in November 2021, engaged in direct action in support of voting rights that led to our being arrested. The words that are most often used to describe the professional work that I have done and continue to do are professor, college president, museum director and diversity and inclusion consultant. However, I do not see a contradiction in doing any of that work and being a social justice activist. And all of the voluntary work that I have done and continue to do is in some way connected to the ongoing struggle of our people, and indeed all people, for a more just and equitable world. I trace my activism back to my maternal ancestors, and to my maternal great-grandfather, Abraham Lincoln Lewis. And I remain profoundly proud that my great-grandfather, who preferred to be called A.L. Lewis, and Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune were business partners, strong supporters of educational institutions for African Americans, and a “Race woman” and a “Race man” in support of African American people and their organizations. They were also close friends. Born ten years apart, A. L. Lewis in 1865, and Mary McLeod Bethune in 1875, they were both children of parents who had been enslaved. While A.L. Lewis was only able to acquire an elementary education, Mary McLeod Bethune graduated from the Scotia Seminary and attended Dwight Moody’s Institute for Home and Foreign Missions. However, they both believed that Black children had the right to a formal education, and that was the belief that led Mary McLeod Bethune to establish a private school for girls in Daytona Beach Florida that merged with a private Institute for boys In Jacksonville, Florida that became Bethune Cookman College. A.L. Lewis supported Mary McLeod Bethune and other educators of that era who pioneered in building educational institutions for Black students.

Drs. Bethune and Lewis valued the role of education in explaining the plight of Black people in the U.S., and in presenting the history and herstory of how Black people had and continued to engage in social justice activism that pushes back against efforts to deny their humanity and their civil and women’s rights. Dr. A.L. Lewis was a strong supporter of Bethune Cookman College and served on the board of trustees of that institution that was founded by his colleague and friend, Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune. Dr. Bethune served on the board of Edward Waters College, located in Dr. A.L. Lewis’ hometown of Jacksonville, Florida, where he was a major financial supporter and a member of the board of trustees. Dr. Bethune was a co-founder of the United Negro College Fund, (UNCF) and Dr. A.L. Lewis was a consistent contributor to UNCF. They both viewed contributing financially to institutions and organizations that support Black people as one way